Dawn in Three Parts

I was just reading Midmarsh John's latest post Friday morning with his photo of a gorgeous dawn sky holding a crescent moon and I realized that some 7 or so hours after he had taken his picture, I had taken some of the same crescent moon at dawn over here on the other side of the Atlantic.  The sky in John's photo has flaming orange clouds with a slim crescent above.  Be sure to check it out.  The image below is more sedate with rosy fingers reaching for the moon over a dove grey sea and clouds. The rays that converge on the sun like this are called "crepuscular rays".

Part 1.  Slim crescent moon chased high into the sky by the rising sun.

Ten minutes later, the sun was high enough to illuminate the grey clouds.

Part 2.  Coral lining in grey clouds.

I turned to the west and saw that dawn had reached across the heavens with sunrays converging at the spot opposite the sun.  Rays like this are called "anticrepuscular rays".  Here is nice website that talks about sunrays and how to see them best.

Part 3.  Dawn sunrays in the western sky.

I took the last 2 photos above from the sunset balcony, yes the very balcony that has been the site of the 2 most recent projects.  The photo below shows the sunset balcony with the upsidedown roof underneath it and the sunshade above it.

Come on up!

 I am really pleased with how the sunshade turned out.

Sunshade extending from under the eaves out to the rail of the balcony.

Just look at all that nice shade.

Twenty-eight minutes past high noon.  The shade is quite pleasant.

The hot-glue gun worked like a charm to hem the edges of the shade cloth.

I wrapped the cloth under the frame on the south (here) and north ends, and secured it to the frame using eyehooks and carabiners.  The hardware is stainless steel to minimize corrosion in the salt air.

I like how the shade cloth lets some light through, so that it doesn't make the inside of the cabana too dark.

View to the west.

Below is a detail showing the hemmed end with the butterfly clip, carabiner and the eyehook screw.

The carabiners will make it easy to take the cloth down if a storm comes up.  I can reach all 11 carabiners without a stool or ladder.  I really don't want to be standing on a ladder with the wind whipping around!

It took us not quite 3 days from start to finish for the sunshade project.  Amazing how quickly it can go when you have the materials at hand.

Up On The Roof

June has been a busy month for us.  Too bad our internet connection has been painfully slooooowwww or I would have blogged about what's been happening sooner.  It's still slow, but I can't wait any longer.  For now, I will go fix breakfast while these images are uploading.

One hour and ten minutes later ...

The first week of June brought us the first of the newly hatched iguanas from the nests on our property.  Not sure how many hatchings there were, but we saw at least 10 different individuals on our veranda.

Baby female (left) and male (right) iguanas cling to the screen on our veranda.  We are thrilled that the breeding was successful.

We also commenced on the second phase of the solar power installation.  Queue up the appropriate music by clicking here.  We have 13 (12 and a spare) big batteries for the battery bank.  Each battery weighs 315 lbs!

The crew slipped 3-piece bundles of threaded rod under the handles so they could carry the batteries up the stairs.

These stairs are 4 ft wide to make it easier to get cumbersome items up.

We had intentionally not installed the rails on these stairs so they could bring the batteries up unimpeded. 

At the top of the stairs we had a heavy duty dolly for the battery so we could roll it to the box.

Getting ready to place the first battery in the box.  

The box is specially designed by Dennis so that it is a Faraday Cage to protect the batteries from lightning strikes and lined on the bottom with an acid resistant fabric to soak up battery acid should there be a spill.  Several other safety features are incorporated, too.  He'll share the details in an upcoming blog.

Checking to make sure the batteries are in the right orientation.

Bring 3 batteries up, one at a time, take a break, repeat ...

Only two more to go.

The ProSolar crew cabled up the batteries and tied them in to the charge controllers.  Then our crew put the front on the battery bank box.  The lids come next.

 Meanwhile, up on the roof, the ProSolar crew mounts the 15 solar panels.

The panels are linked into five sets of three panels.

The output from the panels then goes to two charge controllers to charge up the battery bank (via the battery chargers in the inverter units).  DC output from the battery bank goes back to the inverters and then finally to the breaker box in the form of AC electricity.  All this (except the batteries themselves) takes place in the inverter room, which Dennis also designed with lots of safety features.

The inverter room with the charge controllers (smaller black units in the center) and the 2 inverters (the big units on the right).  The grey units (to the left) with blue lights are disconnect switches and surge protectors.

The solar panels are all on the south-facing roof of the new addition.  The pitch of the roof is such that the panels are angled directly toward the sun during the winter months.  This will help compensate for the shorter day length in winter. The angle of the sunlight is not optimal for summer, but the longer day length will offset that.  At least that is how we planned it, time will tell if it actually works out that way.  Theory vs actual.

And here are the 15 panels.  Note the lightning rods along the ridgeline and at the lower eave.  Cables are in the white flexible conduits leading to the inverter room below.

Can't you just feel those photons being absorbed by the solar panels in the image below?  And a good feeling it is, too.

View from the front.

And I will leave you now with a view from the Sunset Balcony.  Goodnight photons.  See you tomorrow.